Over the past 20 years, UK packaging recycling rates have more than doubled. In conjunction with the UK Packaging Regulations, the UK has also developed one of the most comprehensive kerbside collection systems in Europe.
Last Wednesday encapsulated what I think LARAC is all about. It was the first day of RWM and we had a stand there as normal and this met we got to meet members, talk to them about what we do for them, what they want us to do and the state of the industry.
Policy around our resources is in focus in a way unseen for years. Recent activity includes a consultation pending the introduction of deposit return scheme, a review of packaging regulation and its PRN system, changes to waste crime regulation and enforcement powers, the circular economy and extended producer responsibility to list just some. The sector is also within sight [perhaps], due later this year, of a new resources and waste strategy (Therese Coffey, giving evidence at the Environmental Audit Committee, hoped it will come out at the end of November) with hints being made of new waste metrics. Competing with this sudden dynamism for officer time is the frenzy whipped up following Blue Planet II around avoidable, single use plastic and plastic in our oceans that has already brought about the Plastic Pact.
Behaviour Change Communications Expert, Stephen Bates thinks it is but in his latest blog for LARAC, he considers the opportunity to capitalise on the heightened interest in the whole issue of waste and plastic to benefit those other seemingly forgotten materials we so desperately need more of.
Every industry has its unique characteristics and for the UK resources sector it must be collecting in a warehouse on the outskirts of Birmingham just as the summer starts to fade!